My Wedding Day
by June Magic
Summary: Thanks to an absurd Marriage Law the Ministry of Magic, Severus Snape is forced to marry. Here are his thoughts on that day. Translation by QalaChaki.


A big _THANK YOU_ QalaChaki, who translated this story from Spanish. This is the first time I can read one of my stories in English, and I'm very proud of it.

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**My Wedding Day**

I felt so strange. My wedding day. I never thought to see that day and yet there I was, putting on the suit that Lupin—Lupin, of all people—had helped me pick out. If not for him, I probably would have worn one of the laboratory smocks I taught in every day at Hogwarts. And later on I wouldn't have been able to forgive myself, although at the time I had no idea.

And while I gathered my hair at the nape with a satin ribbon—have no illusions the hair was as greasy as ever—I thought about my wife-to-be. Hermione Granger.

Had it not been for the absurd Ministry of Magic, it would never have occurred to me to get married, much less to her. Merlin, she was almost a child! And to tell the truth, I had difficulty seeing her in any other light. It would be hard to live with her… why hadn't she protested when they told her she had to marry me? Not that she had many alternatives, but even so, I hadn't expected her to resign herself to her fate without even a struggle.

And so it was that soon I found myself standing in front of everyone in the middle of Molly Weasley's garden, awaiting the arrival of _my bride_.

The music began and there she was, on her father's arm, dressed all in white. The dress had one of those corset arrangements that left her shoulders bare, with a full skirt made of some diaphanous material I only knew was neither silk nor cotton—the only two fabrics I recognize. Her face was obscured behind a gauzy veil—a Muggle tradition that I'd never seen used in a magical wedding. But despite the veil, I could see her emotions: fear, sadness, and a resignation that beggared description.

It was only then that I truly realized what was happening: this child was going to be my wife. _My wife_.

I had a mad impulse to fly out the side door, to Apparate to the middle of the Sahara, to run off to hunt polar bears in the Arctic. But then Mr Granger placed his daughter's hand in mine. A small, soft hand; almost the hand of a child… but she was no child. He had surrendered her to me, had given her into my care. It was up to me to protect her, which was the principal reason for this marriage. I would have to take care of her; she would be mine… _mine_.

We turned to face Kingsley Shacklebolt, who was conducting the ceremony under the auspices of the Ministry.

It would be exaggerating to say that I remember everything that happened. I know only that I felt lightheaded, heard Shacklebolt's words as from a distance, as in a dream. Until I heard him ask:

"Severus Tobias Snape, do you take Hermione Jean Granger as your wife?"

And I answered, automatically, "I do," without thinking, without pausing, as if it were someone else speaking. Then I heard her say the same, in a low, indistinct voice, like the voice of someone who hasn't spoken in a long time and needs to clear her throat.

We exchanged rings and then Shacklebolt pronounced us husband and wife, and I knew the magic had bound us for life.

"You may kiss the bride." Kingsley had hesitated a moment before pronouncing the customary words, given the circumstances of the ceremony, but in the end he came down on the side of tradition.

She was trembling. I lifted the veil gently. How beautiful and delicate she looked! Her eyes were filled with tears, which spilled over when she blinked. I took her face gently between my hands and wiped the tears away with my thumbs. So beautiful, so fragile.

I kissed her. It was the first kiss I had ever given her, and I wanted it to be real. But I didn't want to embarrass her in front of everyone, so I made it firm, and quick. She startled—probably she had been expecting nothing more than a kiss on the cheek—but she parted her lips and kissed me back. And then I was the one surprised.

Everyone gathered round to congratulate us, although I suspected that many would sooner have given her their condolences. But I didn't care: she was my wife now, and there was nothing they could do about it.

We cut the wedding cake (Molly had really outdone herself—heart-shaped fireworks shot from the cake at the first touch of the knife) and my bride danced with her father. I withdrew to a corner and sat down to watch my wife from the shadows, my hand around a glass of Firewhisky. Remus dragged a chair up next to me and sat astride it, also with a glass in his hand.

"What do you want, Lupin?" I asked wearily.

"Nothing," he replied. "I just wondered if you were planning to dance with your bride or were going to leave it up to me to do it."

Oh. Dancing. I was always rubbish at that, hadn't had too many opportunities in my life. But if I was ever to do it, now would be the time. I finished off the Firewhisky in one swallow, put the empty glass into Lupin's hand, and stood up._ A man's got to do what a man's got to do_, I told myself, and went up to my wife and father-in-law.

I stopped next to them. I didn't ask permission—why would I ask permission to dance with my own wife?

My father-in-law looked at me, smiled, and nodded. "Severus," he said, and passed me his daughter's hand.

I took her in my arms and we began to dance. Her waist, cinched into the corset, felt so tiny that I wanted to crush her against me, but I didn't. We danced the waltz in silence. She seemed incapable of looking me in the eyes, staring fixedly at my tie. Nevertheless she gave herself over easily to my lead, without a moment's hesitation. She danced like a leaf caught in the wind. _And I was that wind._

The guests began to leave. There hadn't been that many, after all, and Hermione was beginning to look tired. We said our good-byes, and some took the opportunity to whisper words of comfort in her ear. What kind of monster did they think I was? But I had no illusions, I had known this would happen. After all, I am Severus Snape, the hated potions master, the ex-Death Eater.

I put my arm around my wife's waist and asked if she was ready, and she nodded; we Apparated to my house in Spinner's End. Our house, now.

I steadied her for a moment so that she could regain her balance, but she jumped away from me almost immediately. Her gazed roamed about the room, and I cursed myself in silence for having brought her here on our wedding night, to a place so cold and lacking in beauty. A home that had never known the love of a family.

"Welcome home," I said anyway. "You can make whatever changes you like later. I'm sorry I don't have a more suitable house, but… "

"No, it's fine," she interrupted.

She spun around, shedding the hairpins that her mother had used to hold her hair and veil in place, shaking her hair free. She dropped the veil over a chair and asked, looking me forthrightly in the eyes, "Can we… can we go to the bedroom?"

"Of course," I said, pleased that she had finally left her sadness behind and begun again to behave like the valiant young woman she was. She hadn't faced the Dark Lord only to quail in the presence of her own husband.

I took her by the hand and led her upstairs, and let her precede me into the room. Thank Merlin I had had the good sense to prepare the bedroom for her, buying a large bed, a new counterpane, and a dresser for her things. Hermione went over to the bed and smoothed her hand over the counterpane, which up until now had been the only beautiful thing in the house. Now there were two—her and the coverlet.

I stayed back in the corner and began to take off my coat, vest and tie, thinking to keep my shirt and trousers on—as comfortable as I could make myself without frightening her.

But she apparently thought I was undressing completely, for, with her gaze fixed on me, she began to untie the laces of her corset.

"No!" I stopped her, crossing the bedroom in two strides. I took her by the shoulders and slid my hands down her arms to her hands. I brought them together in front of her, and kissed them. "Not yet."

She looked at me with a mixture of surprise and incredulity. I couldn't help but smile at her, with that sarcastic smirk that is my trademark, a bad habit I can't seem to shake. I laid her hands gently against my chest and took her by the waist. Encircling her tiny waist with my hands, I could only close my eyes and sigh, in spite of myself. I held her in my arms and pressed her against my body, as I had wanted to at the reception. I heard her groan very softly, and looking at her I saw that she, too, had closed her eyes and was breathing rapidly, her breasts threatening to escape from the corset. Was she frightened or was she enjoying it? I knew so little about women…

I knew the moment had arrived to have the dreaded conversation about our new situation. But I had no idea how to begin.

"Hermione… I know I'm not what you would have wanted for yourself. And I wouldn't have been looking for a wife if it hadn't been for that stupid law. But here we are, and you're my wife, and I'm going to treat you as such. I know that in the past I didn't treat you … appropriately, but that's done. You're Madam Snape now, and you'll have the respect you deserve."

She smiled sweetly and said, "I never expected less of you, Professor."

I smiled and corrected her. "I'm not your professor anymore. I'm your husband."

"Sorry, it's hard for me to adjust to that from one minute to the next."

It was a short, awkward conversation, but neither of us seemed in full possession of our eloquence at the moment.

We looked into each other's eyes.

I stroked the contours of her cheek with the back of my hand. "You're mine now," I said, my chest constricted with emotion. And then I kissed her passionately, pressing her into my body. I don't know what happened at that moment, but I heard her groan again into my mouth, and I lost whatever control I had left.

My mouth still on hers, I began to explore her body with my hands: her impossible waist, her trembling breasts, her wild hair. She opened her mouth to me, and her hands clutched at my shirt. Her lips were soft, moist, still tasting faintly of wedding cake. Her tongue found mine, and a wave of dizziness hit me--it seemed to me that the world was suddenly spinning too fast. All the blood in my body seemed to have migrated to one part in particular, leaving me unable to think clearly. I must make her mine this instant, or die from wanting her. How was it possible that only this morning I had thought her a child? How was it possible that a girl I hadn't given a second glance to before was making me lose control like this?

My plans to move slowly and cautiously with her forgotten, I pulled savagely at the laces of her corset to loosen it. Stepping back to catch my breath, I looked in her eyes: they were luminous with desire. She was at my mercy. By her own will.

"Mine."

"Yes."

The dress fell to her feet, and instead of waiting for her to climb out of it—for it was quite voluminous—I lifted her in my arms, up and out of it. I deposited her gently on the bed, and lay down at her side, almost covering her.

She was wearing only her knickers and her shoes. All white. Like a virgin.

I began kissing her again, but this time I didn't stop at her mouth. Her skin was so soft and inviting that I had to trace it with my lips—first along her jawline back to her ear, then her neck, down to her collarbone. And with every touch her parted lips rewarded me with stifled groans. Each one of them inflamed my senses more than I would have thought possible. I was touching her, playing her like a musical instrument, drawing beautiful notes from her, composing melodies in my mind and in my body.

My hands slid upwards from her ribs, lifting her breasts—which were not large, but not too small either—two small warm mounds that fit perfectly into the palms of my hands. Her nipples were hard, and my fingers pinched them lightly, provoking a strangled cry.

"I'm sorry."

"No!" was her only reply.

I smiled and did it again, eliciting the same response. My mouth felt irresistibly attracted, as if by a Summoning spell, and it closed over one of them, licking, sucking, and she arched her back to offer them to me, trembling. Her hands held me there, caressing me, keeping me from raising my gaze to look at her. But I wanted to see her. I caught her hands in mine, and in one fluid movement I raised myself over her, pinning her hands onto the pillow above her head, searching out her gaze. Hermione looked aroused, her breast heaving, her cheeks flushed, and her lips red and swollen from the passion with which they had kissed and been kissed.

"Sweet Merlin, Hermione, how could I not have noticed how beautiful you are? Christ, I'm a lucky bastard."

I saw her lose herself in my eyes, and she struggled until her hands were free. Then she ran them over my eyelids, my eyebrows, my cheekbones, my lips, my horrific nose. She seemed in a trance.

"Be careful what you wish for… " she whispered, and brought my face down to kiss me. And my eyelids, my eyebrows, my cheekbones, my lips, my horrific nose. And then my lips again, but this time she was more demanding. And I, in a fog of absolute desire, fell on her body, pressing it back against the mattress. My cock was so hard it hurt, an ache at once delicious and terrible, and the only way of relieving it was to thrust it against her. Her body responded in kind, writhing under me, arching her back and lifting her hips to seek me out. Never, in all my life, had I been desired in this way, and the very idea bewildered me, but I was unable to resist the feeling.

"Severus," she groaned my name and pulled at my shirt, trying to unbutton it. As exciting as the idea of being undressed by her hands was to me, I was too anxious to tolerate the delay, and I murmured a spell to vanish my clothes. Ah, the sweet uses of wandless magic! When I was studying it I had no idea it would prove so _useful_.

The ribbon holding back my hair disappeared along with my clothes, and my hair fell across her face. I thought Hermione would loathe the contact of my greasy hair with her face, but she seemed delighted; she rubbed my black locks across her face, buried her hands in them and stroked me. The feeling of being completely desired, defects and all, produced a feeling of lightness in my heart, as if a great weight had been lifted off my shoulders.

And then something strange happened.

I laughed.

I laughed wholeheartedly.

Hermione looked at me in alarm, thinking perhaps that I was laughing at her, but soon she was covering me with kisses, and laughing herself.

But the laughter did not last long. Her legs parted, and then only the delicate lace of her knickers separated us. It was a situation I could not long tolerate, and my kisses began descending slowly, to her breasts and then to her belly. I deposited one final kiss over the lace, and we both groaned in unison. I touched her lightly through the fabric, which was soaking wet. I felt a swell of pride: she was this wet because of me, in readiness for me. Me, the greasy bat of the dungeons.

I pulled the delicate fabric to one side, and my fingers slipped into her glossy, trembling flesh, making her writhe and groan and grasp the coverlet. The smell of her excited me even more, which I hadn't really thought possible. My fingers slipped gently into her, penetrating her, and I heard my name burst from her lips: "Se… Severus…"

I withdrew my fingers, now glistening with her fluids, and looked up into her brown eyes, half-closed, obscured by a haze of profound desire. And as she watched I put my fingers, covered with the evidence of her lust, into my mouth, tasting it as greedily as if it were ambrosia. She closed her eyes in a euphoric gesture, her red lips in a perfect O, and from them came a hoarse groan that resonated within me like the underground tremor of an approaching earthquake.

On the verge of madness, I ripped away the delicate lace to expose her most intimate parts to the mercy of my ravenous mouth. My wife fell back against the mattress, defenseless, and abandoned herself to the pleasure I was giving her. My tongue traced the moist folds of her flesh, tasting it; my nose lost itself in that fragrance that at once soothed me and drove me wild; and all the while a litany of groans spilled from her lips. My tongue grazed the button of her clitoris, and she lifted her hips to meet me, searching for more. I licked her, penetrated her with my tongue as far as I could, concentrating on those places that seemed to give her the most pleasure. My fingers pushed inside her while my tongue continued to torment her clitoris, until I had to stop because I couldn't hold back any longer. I knew she was almost there, on the brink of giving it all up to me—and I, as always a selfish bastard, was unwilling to let that marvelous gift be lost to the air.

"Hermione, are you a virgin?"

"No," she answered, a little sadly.

"Thank the gods," I murmured, and raising myself over her once more, I penetrated her in one smooth, continuous movement, all the way, growling from the depths of my throat.

I looked into her eyes. So beautiful. She felt so marvelously tight around me, and I had a moment of terrible possessiveness. I pinned her wrists above her head, immobilizing her.

"You're mine now," I whispered. "All mine. No going back." Bearing down on her with every word.

"More, Severus. More." Her voice was intense. "Talk to me more; your voice is… amazing."

So, my voice thick with desire and with the realization of my desire, I rode her and I talked to her. I told her how wonderful she was, how beautiful and how perfect, more perfect than my most audacious dreams. That she was mine and mine alone, and I would never let her go; that her body was more splendid than Galatea herself, that she tasted sweeter than ambrosia, that her groans were the loveliest music my ears had ever heard. Perfect, perfect, perfect. And _mine_.

And I, Severus Snape, master of eloquence, began to lose my head and stammer incoherently when the muscles of her cunt began to clench rhythmically around my cock, and her body tensed like a bowstring and released itself in a perfect orgasm, uttering sharp little cries and whispering, "Professor." My last ounce of control evaporated, and I rode her hard, forgetting how fragile she was, crushing her beneath me and releasing a shout that was animal, basic, primordial, at the precise moment when my seed left my body to deposit itself in hers.

I fell onto her exhausted, unwilling to leave the warmth of her body, catching my breath. As soon as I came to my senses I tried to roll off to one side, to let her breathe freely, but she held me back fiercely. "Don't go yet. I want to feel you inside me." And grasping my face between her hands she drew me down into a kiss—this one gentle, tender.

I raised myself up on my arms so as not to crush her.

"You called me 'Professor,'" I said, smiling.

"You called me lots of other things and you don't hear me complaining."

I smiled gently. She was right, of course. I buried my fingers in the bird's nest that was her hair, remembering how she had played with mine. What a lovely pair we made, with our unruly hair. But now I was in love with this bird's nest and wouldn't have traded it for even the sleek shimmering locks of Fleur Delacour.

"Why did you look so sad when I asked if you were a virgin?"

"I thought you'd be disappointed. Why else would you ask?"

"Merlin, no, I was afraid of hurting you!"

And now poised over her, enjoying the peace that one feels after making love, I remembered her words.

"Why did you say 'Be careful what you wish for?'"

"Because you might get it."

I frowned, still somewhat perplexed. Her clear laughter washed over me, and she began to explain.

"When I was in sixth year I started to fancy you."

I looked at her in disbelief, but she went on.

"I don't know, maybe it was your voice, your movements, your intelligence, your sarcasm—or maybe your courage in working for the Order."

I rolled off to one side, trying to process the information.

"Is that why you accepted my offer of marriage? The Order told me it was to protect you from the fugitive Death Eaters!"

"Severus. I faced Voldemort himself—do you think I couldn't deal with a Death Eater? That's what I told the Order, but they wouldn't listen. I could have married Ron… but I didn't want to."

"Then why were you crying during the wedding?"

"Because I was afraid, Severus. It's one thing to want something and another thing entirely to get it. I had no idea what I was getting into. But it looks like it didn't turn out too badly, right?

She looked at me with anxious eyes. I kissed the tip of her nose, and then her mouth, and then drew her into an embrace.

"Christ, I'm a lucky bastard."

"Well, it was about time."

We lay there, caressing each other absently, until we both began to fall asleep. In between dreams I heard her speak.

"And you, Severus? Did you ask me to marry you just because the Order asked it of you?"

"Yes. But you changed my mind. You're the bravest, most intelligent woman I know. And beautiful to boot." I pressed her against me and kissed her neck, making her shiver. "If I had it to do over again I'd choose you in an instant… Merlin, Hermione, be still or I won't be responsible for the consequences!"

It was a long night.

A week later Potter married Ginny Weasley, one of the hailstorm of weddings provoked by the absurd (and wonderful) Marriage Law. It would be the first time that we appeared in public as "the Snapes." I knew that everyone would whisper and regard me with loathing, as if they hadn't been the ones to ask that I marry Hermione. I hadn't the slightest desire to attend, but Hermione insisted that she had no intention of missing her best friend's wedding, and she refused to go alone.

We arrived by Floo; I came out of the fireplace first and reached a hand in to help my wife out. She brushed off an ash that had stuck to my hair, and took me proudly by the arm. Everyone stared silently at us, waiting, but Hermione greeted them with a satisfied smile.

Christ, I'm a lucky bastard.


End file.
